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The wailing of sirens announced trouble's arrival long before the engines came whipping around the darkened corner. Far down the street, a porch light flickered on and curtains rustled to life as the groundskeeper's children pressed their noses to the glass, which glowed red and orange in the night. The air was thick and hot with ash while bright cinder-flecks spiraled up into the darkness and disappeared. The scent of burning evergreens wafted heavily across the lawns, and the sound of heated mortar cracking seemed to echo loudly.

In a jumble of tangled equipment and shouting voices, men clad in heavy yellow and reflective gray leapt from the engines and poured across the landscaping toward the buildings. The blaze was reflected in their bulky, bug-like helmets like some sick mirror. Most made their way to the old school and the outcroppings of outer classrooms, storage sheds and ancient dormitories, unwinding and training their hoses on the flames, while the rest took to hustling the two hundred or so sobbing teenaged girls away from the chaotic mess. Soot stained bed linens and dirty bare feet trembled at the edge of the property.

A second ball of flame erupted toward the rear of the building, now little more than a sagging heap of charred brick and crumbling beams, and roared out across the garden to lick at the rapidly blackening leaves of dead chrysanthemums and hydrangea. Grass curled and died at its passing. The sound of swinging axes and bellowing voices was lost behind a wall of fire that towered ever upward. Ambulances arrived and paramedics shot out of the backs in starched white shirts, unloading the gurneys and rushing in to help.

Natalie Fairbanks stood back with the other girls at the edge of the street, watching the scene unfurl. Well, not quite "with" the other girls. While the others huddled together in murmuring clumps, wrapped in sooty blankets and clutching one another's hands, Nat was off to the side, still dressed in jeans and a sweat-streaked tank top. The last of the flames glowed on her pupils as the firefighters raced this way and that with their snake-like hoses. She wrung her hands and tried valiantly to keep from to swallow her tongue. Her knees rattled painfully.

Nearby, the others were talking amongst themselves, none offering to include her in their hushed conversations. Not that she wasn't used to it. Socialization wasn't one of her most highly acclaimed talents. Most chattered softly about the fire: how hot it was even this far back, whether or not there were any parts of the school left untouched, how much it would cost to replace the rooms of books and computer equipment that any good school had. It was Lily's voice that caught Nat's attention, like a fishing hook around her earlobe.

"I wonder if they have a suspect yet."

The others around her hushed at the words, not sure how to react. Morgan, standing nearest to Nat, took a step closer to the girls, and twisted a strand of hay-colored hair around her little finger. Her thin pink lips pursed, drawing together in a little knot, and her brows arched downward.

"Don't be an idiot, Lily. They don't have suspects for accidents. Somebody out at the sheds probably left the lid off of some paint or something. That's all."

Lily leaned a little toward Nat, pretending to be scuffing her slipper against the curb. "Please! Do you think a little paint could do all that? That'd have to be some bloody strong fumes." She indicated the collapsing building with a jerk of her freckled chin. She said loudly, carefully enunciating, "It was on purpose. And I'd bet just about anything that the person who did it will be caught by morning. After all, anyone having anything to do with something like this ought to be locked up with all the other freaks and psychos."

Nat's face began to burn lightly, from within rather than without. Real fire never burned like that. She tried to slink toward a block of trees at the edge of the property, but Lily's shrill voice stopped her dead.

"Hey, why are you dressed like that, Fairbanks? Isn't it a little late to be out cruising for girlfriends?" She smiled widely and stood with arms akimbo, tossing her thick braid over her shoulder, somehow looking threatening even though she was dressed in blackened lavender pajamas and a sooty kimono robe. "Just what will your daddy say?"

Nat's world fell silent. The ambulances melted away, the fire were snuffed, the last of the shouting voices were muffled into oblivion. Silence roared in Nat's ears. Her fingers began to twitch and she felt her legs go leaden. She dug her heels firmly into the soil to keep herself from teetering.

"Oh, that's right! Natty, I'd forgotten. Didn't your daddy die in a fire? Quite sorry. My mistake, really," Lily sneered, folding her narrow arms across her chest.

Morgan tugged on Lily's wrist and whispered something that Nat couldn't hear, but Lily pushed her backward. Morgan stumbled backward against a juniper bush and nearly fell as the narrow, gnarled branches attached to her pajama pants, regaining her footing and standing with her feet in a heap of fertilizer. Her cheeks blushed and she fell silent, embarrassed. Nearly a dozen girls had made it over to the trees and were listening to Lily's rants, curiously following the sound of the girl's shrilling.

"You know as well as I do that little Freaky Fairbanks is behind all this," Lily bit off in Morgan's direction. She turned her gaze to the growing crowd and lifted an eyebrow in defiance. "And if you're going to just stand here sniveling and not do anything about it, well then you're all worthless bits of rubbish like her."